Lila Abu-Lughod focuses cultural difference using anthropology to express her points while still remaining objective about how those cultural differences are portrayed, used, and misrepresented in "Do Muslim women really need saving? Anthropological reflections on cultural relativism and its others. Lila Abu-Lughod.""Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving? Anthropological Reflections on Cultural Relativism and Its Others"American Anthropologist, 104:3 (2002):783 To support Abu-Lughod's thesis She first starts with a statement on how generalized conversation about the middle east has been since 9/11. She also addressed an active push to connect the culture in regards to the Middle East with the attack that was not only pushed by the media but …show more content…
" Recreating an imaginative geography of west versus east, us versus Muslims, cultures in which first ladies give speeches versus others where women shuffle around silently in burqas." Ibid.784 She argues that this concern is artificial. Much like Cultural ecology it focus on the fact their there is a problem without any relation to history or a solution to the problem that would work to improve the problem within the realm of the community being painted as a victim that needs saving. Lila Abu-Lughod concludes her point with saying people should be suspicious whenever messy history is reimagined to paint a different narrative. "we need to be suspicious when neat cultural icons are plastered over messier historical and political narratives, so we need to be wary when lord Cromer in British-ruled Egypt, French ladies in Algeria, and laura bush, all with military troops behind them, claim to be saving or liberating Muslim women." Lila Abu-Lughod.""Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving? Anthropological Reflections on Cultural Relativism and Its Others"American Anthropologist, 104:3
After the attack on the World Trade Centers in 2001, conspiracies began to fly, fingers were being pointed, and accusations were being made. Nine years after the attack, Omar Ashmawy wrote an essay “Ten Years After 9/11. We’re Still in the Dark” to the Washington Post. In his essay, he argues that US citizens are not well enlightened on the cultures of the Islamic and Arabic people and that ignorance gets in the way of obtaining a healthy relationship with Arab and Muslim countries. With his wise use of pathos, logos, and ethos, Ashmawy creates a well written essay that captures the heart of his readers and gives an inspiring glimpse into the effects of 9/11.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a civil rights activist from Georgia. After being arrested in Birmingham, Alabama, Dr. King wrote a letter that would eventually become one of the most important documents of the Civil Rights Movement. The Letter from Birmingham Jail, was “ostensibly addressed,” to the clergymen of Alabama (Westbrook, par. 7). It was really written for white moderates and President John F. Kennedy. Dr. King`s letter defends the nonviolent resistance by African Americans and criticized the clergymen`s Call for Unity.
El-Ghobashy’s relative privilege as an academic at an Ivy League school affects the rhetorical choices she makes in the essay by serving as justification for her thoughts and actions. She is able to express her concern on stereotypes in a logical and academic way that makes her a credible source. It also serves to defy stereotypes. Her privilege supports her argument that one Muslim woman cannot represent all Muslim woman and her belief that stereotypes need to be disregarded because she is a Muslim woman working for a doctorate degree, which may seem like a feat to someone who believes in and contributes to the use of stereotypes. In her essay, she also notes that hundreds of “other Muslims, Sikhs, and non-Muslim Arabs contended with physical
In Western nations, arguments against the burqa are sometimes stoked by racist and nationalist discourse that demonizes Muslim women who wear it. It is important to understand
On the other hand, patriarchal norms and ideals that aimed to regulate women's behavior and bodies affected the Islam of men. Leila Ahmed's book offers a distinctive viewpoint on Islam and the ways in which gender and identity converge with religious practice overall. Ahmed illustrates the diversity of Islamic ideas and behaviors and refutes the idea that Islam is a single, homogeneous religion by contrasting Islam among women and men. The truthfulness of any interpretation of Islam is ultimately arbitrary and reliant on personal experiences and perceptions. We may,
Samira Ahmed’s realistic fiction novel, Love, Hate, and Other Filters, takes place in modern-day Chicago where a suicide bombing has engrossed the attention of America. Maya Aziz, a Muslim teenager, is targeted for her heritage while attempting to lead a life free of high school drama, controlling parents, and difficult relationships. As Maya copes with Islamophobia, prejudice against Muslims, she begins to understand the horrors and shortcomings of violence. One lesson the story suggests is that hatred is an infectious and blinding motive. From the very beginning of the story, readers are familiarized with the source of terrorism through thorough description and sentence structure.
Former President Jimmy Carter gives readers a look into his fight for women’s equality in his early life, presidency, and involvement in the Elders Organization in his book A Call to Action: Women, Religion, Violence and Power. This book serves as an urgent message to all nations and religions regarding the inequality women face not only in developing nations, but in the United States and other first-world countries, where women confront different kinds of oppression and mistreatment that often go unnoticed and unaddressed. A major focus in this work is the struggle of women in African and Middle Eastern countries where male hierarchy is still deeply integrated into customs and society. He explains how the Carter Center has worked side-by-side with international leaders and human-rights activists to address issues such as honor killings, FGC (Female Genital Cutting) and HIV, and has made incredible progress in combating these concerns.
Additionally, the author practices Islam and states that because of her experiences, she can not accept that she is seen as a second-class human because she is a female. The introduction to and interpretations of Islam which she had was one of justice, truth, beauty, and grace, and religion which is one of justice and equality, and therefore, the injustice which women have been subjected to cannot be rationalized as the will of a God of justice. The author points to men’s incorrect interpretation of the Qur’an and hadith as the reason for anti-women interpretations, which have, according to the author, created later misogynist
For example, Stephens quotes Pamela K. Taylor (a Muslim woman) as saying, “the veil…is ‘a clear statement that I did not want to be judged by my body…but as an individual… (Stephens pg. 5).” On the other hand, for Amish women, the veil “by design minimizes individuality, creating belonging to the larger group… (Stephens pg. 5).” This idea of the Muslim veil as empowering could be a dialectical adoption by American Islam from the larger American culture in which it exists, and evidence to the “melting-pot” idea of multiculturalism in the United States. While the Amish resist modern society by a “theological mandate (Stephens pg. 7),” they refuse any conformity to the larger society, and, thus, remain “in the past.” As American Muslim women “live in and among a larger non-Muslim community (Stephens pg. 7),” not only do they bring their cultural ideas into the larger American culture, they also adopt American ideals into their own culture.
September 11th, 2001, left a devastating impact on not only the United States, but worldwide. Many families had been separated and many souls were lost in what was one of the most terroristic events that has ever happened on American ground. As two planes crashed into the Twin Towers located in New York, thousands of people would be left stuck in the crumbling building, some able to escape, while others were not as lucky. In an essay by Peter Bergen called “Could it Happen Again? In the National Interest”, Bergen highlights inside details of the fatal attack and what caused Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda to reign its terror on the Twin Towers.
Hosseini portrays how this treatment of women was accepted in Afghani culture because men’s superiority was derived from tradition. He depicts a culture in Afghanistan where wives were seen as mere possessions, so their husbands found fault with them for the inconveniences they experienced. Hosseini demonstrates the mistreatment of women in Afghanistan through the multiple examples he provides where men laid blame with women for circumstances beyond the women’s control or for which were not solely to blame for, just as Nana had warned Mariam that they were prone to do. The first instance in which Nana’s statement rings true is when Nana found out for herself how easily women in Afghanistan could be held completely accountable for things that were not solely their responsibility.
Arab women’s way of life and gender roles they play in the United States has been coupled with much of their culture preservation and responsibility in trying to bring a future generation that follows and sticks to the religion and religious’ doctrines, as according, most of the Arab race being the dominant in Islam as their religion of pride. Arab women in the United States have always tried might and mail in proving to follow in the latter the religion they have opted for the length to be favorable to them, even as they face many challenges and living in a country where most of the population is from other religions, hence being the minority religion but this has not barred them to work harder in passing it to the future generation. The
In fact, the term Islamic feminism becomes a global phenomenon during 1990s and is a contrast to secular
In the late 1800s, Arab American literature began to emerge in the USA. The Arabs arrived in North America as immigrants. Moreover, they settled in cities such as New York and Boston and they wrote in newspapers about political and sectarian events in the Middle East. Khalil Gibran, Ameen Rihani and others formed the Pen League and they introduced the Mahjar school of Arab-American writing. Their objective was to create bridges between East and West and create philosophical meeting points between Arab and American ideologies.
This highlights the importance of how these acts of cruelty Mariam and Laila faced; ‘fear of the goat, released in the tiger’s cage’ is what ultimately defines their inner feminist strength, ‘over the years/learned to harden’ which shows that Mariam and Laila’s past indirectly prepares them for The Taliban’s arrival. The Taliban take away the basic rights of Mariam and Laila ‘jewellery is forbidden’, but they fail to do so. Ironically, it is the society itself that gives them the strength and platform to strike back against Rasheed, who is a cruel, male-dominating character who symbolised and reinforced everything the term ‘anti-feminist’ stands